These Stars Will Guide You Home
by JustAnotherTeenageWriter
Summary: After a near nine year absence in Katara's life, her New-Age traveler mother suddenly shows up on her fifteenth birthday and whisks her away to a life of festivals and fun, where she meets new people, and some old friends. Will this life be everything she has dreamed it would be?
1. Chapter 1

Fate. Destiny. The stars. It's said that all of these things determine the way that your life is going to turn out. People say that there's no sense in fighting them, that no matter what way you turn, no matter how you try and evade it, your destiny cannot be changed. I used to think that, but then I wise old man taught me a little different. Maybe your destiny is set in stone, maybe the fates rule with an ironclad fist, but the one thing that I do know is the stars are just a little different. They expand and shrink and change with the seasons. Just because you can't always see them doesn't mean that they're not always there. And sometimes, in the darkest of nights, they're the ones that guide you home. Even if you didn't know exactly where home was until you find it.

I never sleep very well the night before my birthday. I'm not anxious about some party, my dad and my brother just always stay in, get some sort of takeout, and watch whatever movie I want. This year I've decided on an all night _Parks and Recreation_ marathon and Italian. In recent years my brother has picked something action packed like _Borne _or _Die Hard_ while my dad goes for documentaries. I'm not too curious about what I'm getting either. Whether it's new shoes, or that Bastille CD I've been wanting. It's a cello. Dad already told me.

But there's one thing that keeps me up, waiting at the crack of dawn for the post. There's a letter, sometimes even a package, that I have to get every year. It's one of two days a year I get to hear from her, but it's the only day when she talks to me, and me alone.

She left when I was six, shortly after my birthday. I thought she was leaving for work one morning when she stopped and kissed me and Sokka extra hard and told me that she would always love me and that she would come back for me one day.

My fifteenth birthday is tomorrow and I haven't seen her since.

On my seventh birthday, I got a postcard from Katmandu. It had a picture of a Buddhist temple with a pointy golden roof and weird, staring eyes painted beneath it. The message was written in multiple colors of felt pen and had loads of kisses on it.

When I was eight, a postcard of a donkey with flowers in its mouth, the postmark said Ireland. The next year I got an actual birthday card and a handmade ragdoll that I carried everywhere with me even though I felt like I was a little too old to be playing with dolls.

When I was ten there was a postcard from Morocco with a girl with loads of gold bracelets on. The next year I got a rainbow striped hat that I wore every day until it started to fall apart, and a postcard from Whales. They're both stuck on my cork board along with everything else she's sent me.

For my twelfth birthday she sent me a book about the power of the elements and how they're all tied together. When I was thirteen, she sent me a jade bracelet and a postcard from somewhere in Thailand. It had a picture of an elephant on it. Last year she sent me a necklace with a tiny chunk of pink quartz at the end and I wear it all the time. Even at night.

There was no postcard that year. Just a letter. It was the kind of letter that was difficult to read, even now. But it was a letter that I also needed years ago. It said that she loved me, and that she was sorry and that we would we would be together again someday. I stuck it to my corkboard along with all the other things she'd sent me over the years.

I love my mum. But I can't remember her, not really.

I have two photos of her and both are on my corkboard.

The first is of her and Dad and little Sokka standing in the rain in front of a courthouse, just married. My mum is strong and sturdy looking. Tan skin and brown hair lightened by the sun, that falls just past her shoulders and it's all braided. She's wearing a sack dress (that was once a lace table cloth) over light blue tights and no shoes.

My dad just looks so different it's scary, his hair is way past his shoulders and he's wearing this huge black sweater. All smiles.

I'm in this photo too, just a bump, hidden from view by the flowers that mum's holding some panda lilies she picked up from a random park along the way to the courthouse.

The second photo is five months later and there I am for real. I'm a few weeks old; I was small, even by baby standards. I had blue eyes and light brown hair. Mum's face is looking at the camera, looking pale and lost. I've searched that photo over and over again for signs of blissed out motherly love and all that happy family stuff. I just can't find it. She just looks lost. Unhappy.

We lived all over when I was younger. Never settling in one place for too long. We lived in a bus, a caravan, a crumbling flat where mold grew on the walls. We toured the music festival, Mum and dad selling lentil soup, dream catchers, scented candles, and homemade earrings. You name it, they did it. They also worked in an organic veggie garden, a whole food café, and even a clog workshop. We lived off of welfare and bought me and Sokka second-hand shoes and forgot to brush my hair so it got all matted and tangled and fluffy and they never cut Sokka's so it made old ladies at bus stops shake their heads and tut.

Mum and Dad were New Age travelers-hippies, punks, modern-day gypsies, my childhood was a blur of tents and festivals and scruffy vans, a ragtag group of happy strangers in mismatched clothes and weird hair.

In the end, they tried to stay still, to settle in one place. Be a "normal" family. They tired, Dad said, to give us a name, a family, a future. A life. Mum tried. But not hard enough.

Eventually she ran away with a guy named Hao. He was taking a camper to Katmandu, and I guess Mum thought that was a better idea than staying around another fifteen years for wiping my nose and not brushing my hair or reading me stories about fluffy bunnies.

We managed Dad, Sokka, and me. We found a flat without mold on the walls and we started school and dad started art school, learning how to do ceramics, which is just a fancy word for pottery. We made friends with Toph and Suki and Aang, and Dad made mugs and bowls and fancy plates, all glazed with speckled stuff. He also made beautiful models of elves and mermaids that all looked a bit like Mum, but I never told him that.

He finished his course and we rented a place with a workshop attached, and after a while he made enough money for us to live on, selling the bowls and plates to craft shops and the elfy-things to fancy shops and galleries. We stopped eating lentil stew every day and progressed to French bread, waffle fries, and frozen lasagna. We were happy.

Mostly.

Last Christmas, Dad bought me these lights and I draped them all around my corkboard, the place with all the letters and postcards and photos and everything else she's ever given me.

Dad came in one day after I'd put it up and said, "It looks like some kind of Hindu shrine." I just shrugged, because it kind of did. But that's okay, I like it.

It's all I've got of my mum.


	2. Chapter 2

"Hey, Katara! Wake up, birthday girl!"

"Katara, stop being so lazy. Get up!" I hear Sokka add.

Dad brings me breakfast in bed on my birthday, every year. And every year I pretend like I haven't been lying there awake all night thinking about Mum. I make a show out of yawning and stretching and clearing 'sleep' from my eyes.

Dad sets the tray down on my bed and walks to the window and pulls back the curtain. The room floods with light and I do actually squint, waiting for my eyes to adjust.

I look at the tray. It's the same every year- my favorite. Pancakes, but with a special birthday twist. Dad pours the batter and waits for it to cook a bit and then adds a little more to form numbers. This year I have two, spelling out the fact that I'm fifteen. It may seem a little childish, but it smells amazing and I don't care.

Dad sits down at the edge of the bed, still in his pajamas, and grins at me. Sokka takes a seat on the other end and eyes my pancakes hungrily. That boy is a bottomless pit, and on any other day I would have happily shared with him. But not today.

"Happy Birthday, Katara." He says, giving me a hug.

"Thanks, Dad."

No more birthday worries. I take a bite of the pancakes, happy.

There's a panda lily (my favorite) sitting in a jam jar, and a small package wrapped in blue paper. Another favorite, Smarties.

Everything is just the way it was the first time Dad made me birthday breakfast when I was seven. The first birthday after Mum left. I like it like that. It's a tradition.

I take a sip of the grape juice he brought me and smile as I unwrap the Smarties. Dad, Sokka, and I divvy up the ones we like and don't like. After that, Dad and Sokka bring in my presents. A few small packages. He hands me the small ones first.

I open up a box to find a necklace that looks oddly familiar. It's beautiful. It's blue and has a pendent on it with swirly water designs. I've seen it somewhere before but I just can't place where.

"It was your mum's. I thought you would like to have it." Dad tells me. Then it dawns on me.

It's the necklace she's wearing in the wedding photo. Her betrothal necklace.

"Oh no, Dad. I can't take this."

"Nonsense. I want you to have it." He says. I smile and hug him, setting it aside. I don't want to put it on just yet. It's special, and I don't want to wear it for just anything.

I open up another package and find a pair of black Vans inside. Then Sokka hands me something messily wrapped. It's heavy. "Wow. Did you let Toph wrap this for you?" I dig at him, tearing away at the paper.

"Ha freaking ha. Just open it." He says, still smiling.

I get it open and find that it's a book. Not just any book. _The Feminine Mystique. _

"I can't believe you payed enough attention to my feminist rants to remember this is a book I've wanted for a while." I tell him, actually really surprised. I run my fingers over the cover and have to resist from reading it right then and there.

"Yeah, yeah. I did. Whatever." He says, trying to play it off, but I can tell just how pleased with himself he is.

"Thank you." I tell him, really meaning it.

"Alright, I get it. I'm officially the best big brother in the world. You're forever in my debt. The accolades keep on coming about how amazing I am. I'm so amazing that you can't even find the words to describe just how thankful you are." He rambles, totally ruining the moment.

Before I can spit out a retort dad interveins. "That's enough you two. I have on more present to get you." He says with a devious smile on his face and walks out of my room.

I shoot Sokka a glance, but all he does is shrug. Some help he is.

After a few moment Dad returns with a large, cello shaped instrument case. It's made of shiny red, hard molded plastic with a white bow wrapped around the neck.

I scramble out of bed.

"I hope this is okay." Dad says, shooting me a grin.

"It's perfect." I say, starting to try and open it.

"Nope. It can wait 'til after school. Speaking of, the two of you need to start getting ready.

I frown a little, having almost forgotten that it was a school day.

I'm all showered and dressed by the time the post plops onto the rug in front of the mail slot. I look the mail quickly, looking for anything with her hand writing. I find nothing and feel my heart sink a little bit. Once I realize there's nothing from her, I take my time and go through the rest of them.

After school, we pile into the window seat at the Jasmine Dragon, Aang, Toph, Suki, Sokka, and me. We're all school books, uniforms, and smiles.

Lee, our usual waiter rolls his eyes when he see's us all and comes over to take our orders.

"Five Cokes, please." Suki says, holding up a note. Typically we get three and share them amongst us, making them last an hour at least. "_Five_ Cokes?" He asks, feigning shock. "And what might the special occasion be?"

"Katara's birthday." Suki tells him with a smile.

Lee walks away muttering something about hopeless kids, but when he comes back with our drinks I laugh. He's loaded mine with cocktail umbrellas, ice, lemon and orange slices, and even a huge strawberry, all floating around in the sea of brown fizz.

We sip at our drinks and talk about our plans for summer. Toph is going on a cruise around the coast with her family. Which she sees as pointless because she cannot see. Aang said his parents wanted to travel around a bit. 'Just go where the wind takes them' is what they had told him, so he didn't really know where he was going to be. The rest of us were stuck here.

Suki looks at our uniforms and for the millionth time states how much she hates them and how she's ready to get out of them.

"I mean, how is anyone meant to look good in one?" She demands, taking off her tie.

"Green tie with these nasty yellow stripes? Absolutely horrendous."

"Although," Aang says taking the tie from Suki. "They do come in handy from time to time."

I don't see it coming.

There's a quick scuffle, and Aang has the tie over my eyes. Everything goes black, and there's a hand muffling my squeals and more dragging me upright. My so-called "friends" twirl me around a few times before shoving me down again and taking off the blindfold.

I open my eyes and they're all standing in front of me singing "Happy Birthday". Lee is standing there with five slices of hot fudge cake and scoops of vanilla ice cream. The biggest one is loaded with candles; there are even some in the ice cream.

I laugh and blush and blow out the candles and the entire place breaks out in applause. I really love my friends.

We're all walking down the sidewalk on our way home.

Toph has her arm drooped lazily through Aang's. He keeps shooting glances at her, and we all shoot glances at each other. The two seem to be getting kind of _close_ lately.

We get to a light and we wave goodbye to Toph and Aang, Who live down the across the lane and right next to each other.

"I love the bracelet." I tell Aang, hugging him. "And the CD." I tell Toph, hugging her. She ended up getting me the Bastille CD I wanted, she even pulled a few strings with her family connections and got it autographed for me.

"I'll see you later." She says with a wink. I chuckle a bit and say, "Bye, Toph."

Suki, Sokka, and I continue down the lane, after a few moments of silence Suki asks, "Have you heard from her yet?" She's asking about Mum.

Sokka shoots a glance at me slightly worried. I smile a little. "No, not yet."

"Well. That one she sent you from Morocco was late, wasn't it?" She asks. It was three weeks late. I was ten. I stopped talking, I stopped eating, and I couldn't sleep at night. I thought she had forgotten about me. But it came eventually. Dad said the postal service in Africa most have been a little iffy. Definitely not her fault.

"Yeah. It was." I say.

"I'm sure it'll be there when you get home." Suki tells me with a smile.

"Me too." I say.

We stop in front of Suki's house. I give her a hug. "Thanks for everything today, Suk."

"It was no problem. That's what friends are for." She tells me.

Sokka gives her a hug and a kiss on the cheek and she blushes and Sokka looks rather pleased with himself and I have to restrain from rolling my eyes.

"You coming in for a bit?"

"Nah. Food's calling my name. Thanks though. I'll see you tomorrow."

Sokka and I walk to the flat in silence. When we get to the end of the lane I see that there's a grubby, multicolored van sitting in the parkway. Sokka raises his eyebrows at me in question. I just shrug. "Probably just clay delivery for dad." I say, even though I don't see a logo on the side of the van.

Sokka and I let ourselves into the flat. "Dad, we're home." I call.

I walk over to the hall table and see dad has left the mail there while Sokka walks into the kitchen, grumbling something about being hungry, which he always is. I flip through the cards quickly. Still nothing from her. I feel my heart sink, and suddenly I feel a whole lot older than fifteen.

"Kat, Sokka? Could you c'mere a moment, please?" Dad calls.

I oblige. As I walk closer to the living room I can hear Dad talking to someone, I hope it's not his girlfriend, Sango. She's nice, but birthdays are for family only.

Sokka's reached the living room before I did, and he's just standing there, looking at the woman, who I'm sure A) is the owner of the patchwork van out front and B) that I've never seen her before.

Dad is still in his studio clothes, his arms and pants covered in clay. He's looking a little lost.

I know that I'm a little confused.

The woman turns around and I get a good look at her. She has super short hair and about a million and a half earrings, all in one ear. And when she smiles at Sokka and me there's something so familiar about it.

"Just look at the two of you! Just look at how much you've grown! Sokka, you're practically a man now. And Tara, you're such a beautiful young lady."

I feel my heart pick up a little. Only one person ever called me 'Tara'. Dad always called me 'Kat'.

Sokka realizes it at about the same time that I do.

"Hi, Mum."


	3. Chapter 3

This is not how I ever imagined it.

I thought that'd she'd be younger, like in her photos. And that we'd run and hug and spin around and hang on forever and she would kiss the top of my head over and over and over again, I thought that I'd be happy, not confused.

Instead, the room gets all misty and I realise that I'm crying and I'm not entirely sure if these are happy tears or what but then there's a sudden pressure on my hand and it's Dad and he's trying to lead me forward and whispering "Go on, it's okay." So I do and she pulls me close.

I don't want to be here. Not now. Not like this. I'm as stiff as a board, resisting.

'It's okay Katara," she's telling me, stroking my hair. "It's okay. It's okay. It's okay."

I take a ragged breath in, and suddenly I'm overwhelmed by a rich, dark, musty perfume from a long, long time ago. It's patchouli oil. Everything my childhood was.

My body finally reacts and I wrap my arms around her, wet cheek falling on her shoulder, the tears falling freely now. I cling to her for dear life, like if I let go she'll float away. And she just might.

I want this moment to go on forever, it feels like coming home, I've been waiting for so long. Naturally it doesn't, and all too soon she pulls away and I take this opportunity to wipe my face with my sleeve.

"Just look at us." She laughs, now looking at Sokka. "I've missed you, son."

I just now realize that Sokka has remained absolutely silent throughout all of this, something so unlike him.

I shoot a glance at him and he doesn't look happy, in fact, he looks the exact opposite. He looks livid. I've only seen that look on his face once, when some boy at school in the level above me thought that was okay for him to lay his hands on me and Sokka saw, it's terrifying. I don't get it. She's finally here. We finally go our mum back and he's _angry? _I just don't understand him, now more than ever.

"No." He says, his voice strained.

She looks confused. "You don't just get to come back and act like you didn't abandon us." He says.

"Sokka!" I say, taken aback. He's always been one to speak his mind, but this is our _mother _for goodness sake.

"No, Tara. It's alright. He has every right to be mad at me."

"You're damn right I have every right to be mad at you. What are you doing here? Did you just decide to stop by after nine years?" He demands.

"Sokka." I say again, this time my voice much quieter, because now that I think about it, what is she doing here?

She awkwardly laughs it off. "I didn't just 'stop by', love. I drove nearly two-hundred miles just to see you guys. Just to be with Tara on her special day."

My heart flutters just a little.

"Wow. That's so thoughtful! Because of this I've totally forgiven you for leaving us!" He says, starting to yell again.

Mum opens her mouth to say something but before she can Sokka cuts her off and says "You know what. Forget it. Be with 'Tara' on her special day, but don't expect me to be a part of it." And then he storms out the flat. Literally _storms _off, slamming the door shut and everything.

I let go of the breath I didn't know that I was holding and try and reassess the situation because a lot just happened in the last five minutes and Sokka's gone but Mum is back and- _Mum is back. _

I look over at Dad because he has been awfully quiet throughout all of this and he makes eye contact and I can see that he's just about as lost as I am in all of this.

"I'll just go see if I can talk to him." he says after a moment.

He's out the door and then it's just me and Mum and I don't really know what to say. Whenever I imagined her coming back I used to like to try and picture what I would say to her but all of that is lost to me know.

Dad comes back in after a moment and says "He's said he needs to go blow off steam." As he looks at the two of us.

"That's alright." Mum says. "We have a whole lot of catching up to do! And an entire feast to plan!"

"We were gonna get pasta tonight." Dad says, looking kind of helpless. "Tortellini. Would you like to share? Or something different? Different isn't too big of an issue. If it's pasta Kat will eat it." He says, winking at me and I laugh.

"Can't do much pasta." She says, "Didn't I tell you I'm vegan now? No meat, no cheese, no milk, no eggs,, no honey." She adds, frowning.

"Right." He says, looking totally lost.

"Besides," Mum says, "this is a special occasion. Why don't we make miso soup and red bean stew and maybe some muesli cake for dessert? I might even have some quinoa with me. We can all help. How does that sound, Tara?"

"Sure." I say nodding, not sure. "Fine."

"I'm sure the Italian place has some vegan options, all I would have to do is ask." Dad suggests. "Pasta is just kind of a tradition on Katara's birthday."

"No, no!" I say quickly. "Bean stew would be great. Honest, Dad."

I'm lying through my teeth and Dad knows it too, he knows I hate kidney beans and Muesli cake sounds more like a type of hamster bedding rather than a type of food and I have no idea what miso soup is but if your mum turned up after nine years wouldn't you be trying to please her?

"We're gonna be here all night." Dad mutters, heading over to the kitchen.

"So?" She counters, shrugging. "We'll be here all night. What's the big deal?"

And because my mum has told me that she won't be leaving again within the next five minutes I decide to hug her again.

"Mum," I say into her velvet hair, "I've missed you so much!"

"Hey, hey?" She laughs, wriggling free. "I've missed you too! Only don't call me _Mum, _okay? It makes me feel like I'm about a hundred. Just call me Kya."

"Kya, then." I say, the name feeling strange and foreign in my mouth, no worse than _Mum _though I suppose.

In the kitchen, Dad is getting a pot of water to a boil and rinsing rice over the sink. He leaves that for a moment to get a bag of mixed veggies from the freezer and adds them to the water.

"Need any help?" She calls.

"No, no. You two just relax. I've got this all under control.

He adds the rice to the pot, then several dashes of seasonings. He roots about in the cupboard for a jar of curry.

"Can you check to see if that's vegan?" She asks.

"I'm sure it is." Dad responds. Ignoring that Kya gets up to check it herself.

"All of these chemicals and additives just aren't good for you, Hakoda. You should buy organic. There's no goodness left in any of this."

"Still tastes good." He retorts.

"Hey, if you're not going to let me help, at least let me contribute some stuff. I have some things in the van.

It's strange, because the moment she walks out the door my heart twists and I'm suddenly very afraid that she's not going to come back. Dad looks over at me and I must have some look of panic on my face because he says "Why don't you go and see if she needs a hand?" and I wonder how he always knows the perfect thing to say. Years of practice I suppose.

I wonder outside and peer in through the van's open purple door. Inside it's a mad flurry of multicoloured pillows and quilts. All down one side are cupboards adorned with swirls and spirals and crescent moons. There' even a tiny cast iron stove tucked in the corner with the chimney pipe going straight out the top of the roof.

You could _live _in this van. It looks like Kya does.

String of bells are looped across the ceiling, and they jungle as she brushes against them, heaving down a brightly woven bag and a rolled up quilt. She reaches under the tiny sink and pulls out a large mason jar full of a cloudy amber liquid.

"Fire whiskey." She says, seeing me eyeing the jar. "It's for your dad, to try and loosen him up a little bit."

"Okay."

In the house, Kya unrolls the purple quilt and spreads it out across the sofa, suddenly making everything look exotic and foreign. She sits back down and folds her legs up under her, reaching deep into her bag. "Carob!" She announces, pulling out a slab of dirt-colored stuff wrapped up in foil. "Try it."  
>I take a bite. It tastes exactly like dirt too, only less appealing. "Excellent." I say, nodding and trying to swallow it.<p>

"Now- where are they? Ah, got 'em!" She brings out a small package swathed in black velvet. Carefully, she opens the cloth to reveal a pack of cards tied up with a gold cord. They don't look like regular cards.

"Tarot." Kya says, explaining.

"What are they?" I ask, stroking the bright cards as she swirls them face down across the carpet. "What do they do?"

Kya grins at me, her eyes lighting up. "The tarot are ancient fortune-telling cards with a magic all their own. she tells me. "So, how about a glimpse of the future, Tara?"


End file.
